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Preliminary Issues in Christian Theology
Chapter Outline
Defining Christian Theology
Theology and Faith
Tasks of Theology
Theology and God
Theology’s Nature
Theology and the Theologian
Theology and Method
Theology and Orthodoxy
Disciplines of Theology
Diversity, Unity, and Theology
Concluding Reflections
Key Terms
Review Questions
Suggestions for Further Reading
Christian theology can be a daunting subject for students because of the large volume of material to be learned. This chapter discusses the introductory issues that relate to the construction of Christian theology. The knowledge of these issues will be helpful for grasping the idea, tasks, nature, sources, and forms of Christian theology.
Defining Christian Theology
Focus Question: What is Christian theology?
The word theology is a combination of two words—God (theos in Greek) and reason (logos in Greek). Theology can be defined as the “discourse about God,” or the “study of God,” or the “thought about God.” However, defining theology in this way is too broad and fails to account for the uniqueness of the theologies of different religions of the world. For example, it does not account for the differences between Christian theology and Islamic theology. While both Christianity and Islam hold a monotheistic view of God, they understand monotheism differently. Christianity’s view of monotheism allows for a plurality of divine persons (the Trinity), whereas the Islamic view of monotheism does not. In fact, the doctrine of the Trinity is appalling to many Muslims. Since this textbook focuses on Christianity, we must describe Christian theology.
Ideas of Christian Theology
Christian theology is concerned with the imagination and interpretation of God from the perspective of the life and teaching Jesus of Christ. Christian theologians have pursued these Christ-centered acts of imagination and interpretation of God in diverse ways. This diversity of theological views within Christianity exists because theologians do theology with disparate agendas. To illustrate these agendas, I will describe the understandings of Christian theology of four theologians whose works continue to shape Christian theological discourse globally.
Anselm of Canterbury (c. 1033–1109 CE)
Anselm, the former archbishop of Canterbury (England), was a theologian and philosopher. His view of theology can be summarized as “faith seeking understanding.”1 He emphasized the priority of faith or belief in God-talk. Anselm’s goal was to demonstrate to his contemporaries, especially Christians, that belief in God’s existence was rational. He drew inspiration from St. Augustine of Hippo (354–430 CE), who summarized his view of the relationship between faith and reason on the basis of his reading of Isaiah 7:9: “Unless I believe, I shall not understand.” Daniel Migliore’s comments on Augustine’s view of faith and reason are helpful for understanding Anselm’s definition of theology. He writes that the “Christian faith prompts inquiry, searches for deeper understanding, dares to raise questions.”2 Again he states, “Theology arises from the freedom and responsibility of the Christian community to inquire about its faith in God.” Theology is “a continuing search for the fullness of the truth of God made known in Jesus Christ.”3
For Anselm, theology must begin with faith and confidence in the existence of God. This act of faith is the beginning point of a theological inquiry. A Christian should, however, take the next step, namely, to explore logical and coherent ways to explain the mystery of God’s existence and actions in the world. Anselm sets an example by developing the ontological argument for the existence of God. His argument can be summarized in this way: (a) God is that which none greater can be conceived (that is, the greatest possible being); (b) since human beings can imagine God, it is possible that God exists; and (c) since something that exists is greater than that which does not exist, it follows that God exists. Theology is a field of study that deals with faith in the existence of God. This faith, for Anselm, does not oppose the use of reason to explain or demonstrate God’s existence.
Karl Barth (1886–1968)
Karl Barth, a Swiss theologian, was arguably the most prominent twentieth-century Christian theologian. Like Anselm, Barth saw Christian theology as faith seeking understanding. For Barth, human beings come to know God when God gives them the gift of faith and enables them to encounter and experience God’s self-revelation. Human beings can talk about God because God has given them God’s own knowledge of God’s self. Unlike Anselm, Barth was Christocentric (Christ-centered) in his theology. One of the unique contributions of Barth to Christian theology is his presentation of Jesus Christ as the primary test of adequate interpretations of God’s self-revelation. For him, any theologies that conflict with God’s revelation in and through Jesus Christ are inadequate for the Christian church. Barth’s description of Christian theology emphasizes the priority of God’s revelation (Jesus Christ) in the construction of theology. Barth also perceived Christian theology as “a function of the church” and the “scientific test which the Christian Church puts [itself] regarding the language about God which is peculiar to [it].”4 He saw theology as the task of the church. Christians must continue to test their views of God in light of Jesus Christ, the revelation of God.
Rosemary Radford Ruether (b. 1936)
The American theologian Rosemary Radford Ruether unearths the mystified patriarchal assumption that has permeated the structures of Christian theology. Prior to the rise of feminist theology, many Christian theologians either assumed or affirmed the inferiority of women. Like the majority of feminist theologians, Ruether aims to deconstruct and expose both classical and contemporary Christian theologies that diminish and distort the full humanity of women. “Theologically speaking,” writes Ruether, “whatever diminishes or denies the full humanity of women must be presumed not to reflect the divine or an authentic relation to the divine, or to reflect the authentic nature of things, or to be the message or work of an authentic redeemer or a community of redemption.”5 Christian theologies, in the minds of some feminist theologians, must be presumed guilty of patriarchy and androcentricism until proven innocent.
Theologies do not arise in a vacuum. Those theologies that ignore human experiences are in danger of being irrelevant to humanity. One of the main contributions that Ruether’s writings and the works of other feminist theologians have made to Christian theology is the discovery of human experience, particularly the experience of women, as an important source of theology. In the words of Ruether, “The uniqueness of feminist theology lies not in its use of the criterion of experience but rather in its use of women’s experience, which has been almost entirely shut out of theological reflection in the past.”6 Within the broad context of women’s experience, feminist theologians have found the courage to upset the status quo by reflecting upon the diversified experiences of women in different cultures and societies. For example, the experience of a white American woman must necessarily differ from the experience of an African American woman, although they live in the same country. Feminist theologians, therefore, explore the experience of women in their theological works in ways that engage gender, class, social locatio...
